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The Curious Case of Disappearing Marquette Law Review Volume 80 Article 3 Issue 2 Winter 1997 The urC ious Case of Disappearing Federal Jurisdiction Over Federal Enforcement of Federal Law: A Vehicle for Reassessment of the Tribal Exhaustion/Abstention Doctrine Blake A. Watson Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/mulr Part of the Law Commons Repository Citation Blake A. Watson, The Curious Case of Disappearing Federal Jurisdiction Over Federal Enforcement of Federal Law: A Vehicle for Reassessment of the Tribal Exhaustion/Abstention Doctrine, 80 Marq. L. Rev. 531 (1997). Available at: http://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/mulr/vol80/iss2/3 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at Marquette Law Scholarly Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Marquette Law Review by an authorized administrator of Marquette Law Scholarly Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE CURIOUS CASE OF DISAPPEARING FEDERAL JURISDICTION OVER FEDERAL ENFORCEMENT OF FEDERAL LAW: A VEHICLE FOR REASSESSMENT OF THE TRIBAL EXHAUS- TION/ABSTENTION DOCTRINE BLAKE A. WATSON TABLE OF CONTENTS I. Introduction ................................... 534 II. The "PlainbullScenario" .......................... 540 III. The Origins of the Tribal Exhaustion/Abstention Doctrine 547 A. Tribal Judicial Systems: A Brief History ........... 547 B. Promoting Tribal Courts While Retaining Federal Jurisdiction: Exhaustion of Tribal Remedies and the Indian Civil Rights Act ....................... 553 C. National Farmers Union Insurance Companies v. Crow Tribe ..................................... 558 D. Iowa Mutual Insurance Company v. LaPlante ....... 563 IV. The Development of the Tribal Exhaustion/Abstention Doctrine after NationalFarmers Union and Iowa Mutual . 569 A. Guidance from the Supreme Court ............... 570 B. The Flexibility Issue .......................... 575 C. The Applicability Issues ....................... 579 1. Should the Exhaustion/Abstention Doctrine Apply in the Absence of a Pending Tribal Action? . 579 2. Should the Exhaustion/Abstention Doctrine Apply When the Controversy Concerns Incidents Which Occurred Off the Reservation? . 581 3. Should the Exhaustion/Abstention Doctrine Apply When Resolution of the Underlying Dispute Re- quires a Determination of MARQUETTE LAW REVIEW [Vol. 80:531 Federal Law? . 583 4. Should the Exhaustion/Abstention Doctrine Apply When the Federal Government is a Party to the Litigation? . 585 V. Categorization of the Tribal Exhaustion/Abstention Doc- trine: Confusion Regarding Appropriate Analogies ...... 588 A. The Analogy to the Doctrine of Exhaustion of Admin- istrative Remedies ........................... 589 1. A Comparison of the Reasons Behind the Two D octrines ............................... 590 2. A Comparison of the Flexibility and Application of the Two Doctrines ......................... 594 B. The Analogy to the Notion of Comity ............ 597 C. The Analogy to the Doctrines of Abstention ....... 600 1. Younger and the Tribal Exhaustion/Abstention R ule ................................... 601 2. Colorado River and the Tribal Exhaus- tion/Abstention Rule ....................... 607 D. Summation and Transition ..................... 609 VI. Reassessment of the Tribal Exhaustion/Abstention Doc- trine: Plainbull and the Curious Case of Disappearing Federal Jurisdiction Over Federal Enforcement of Federal Law ......................................... 610 A. Plainbull and the Question of Exclusive Federal Juris- diction .................................... 611 B. Plainbull and the Question of Whether the Tribal Ex- haustion/Abstention Rule Should be Deemed an In- flexible Bar ................................ 616 1. General Factors in Plainbull Favoring Retention of Federal Jurisdiction ........................ 616 2. Special Factors in PlainbullFavoring Retention of Federal Jurisdiction ........................ 618 VII. Conclusion .................................... 620 THE CURIOUS CASE OF DISAPPEARING FEDERAL JURISDICTION OVER FEDERAL ENFORCEMENT OF FEDERAL LAW: A VEHICLE FOR REASSESSMENT OF THE TRIBAL EXHAUSTION/ABSTENTION DOCTRINE BLAKE A. WATSON* For the Federal Government and its agencies, the federal courts are the forum of choice. NLRB v. Nash-Finch Company' [T]he presence of federal-law issues must always be a major consideration weighing against surrender [of federal court jurisdiction]. Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital v. Mercury Construction Corporation2 The fact that the Government is attempting to enforce federal law [in federal court] is immaterial. The alleged trespass was to tribal land and considerations of comity require that the tribal courts get the first opportunity to resolve this case. United States v. Plainbull * Associate Professor, University of Dayton School of Law. J.D. 1981, Duke University School of Law, B.A. 1978, Vanderbilt University. The author was an attorney in the Appellate Section of the Environment and Natural Resources Division, United States Department of Justice from 1982 to 1992. The views expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Department of Justice or any other department or agency of the federal government. Research for this article was supported by the University of Dayton School of Law through a summmer research grant. 1. 404 U.S. 138, 147 (1971). 2. 460 U.S. 1, 26 (1982). 3. 957 F.2d 724, 728 (9th Cir. 1992). MARQUETTE LAW REVIEW [Vol. 80:531 I. INTRODUCTION The Supreme Court has "often acknowledged that federal courts have a strict duty to exercise the jurisdiction that is conferred upon them by Congress."4 Because this duty is not absolute,' the Court "has devised a number of complex, often interrelated doctrines to justify either rejection or postponement of the assertion of federal court power even though Congress has vested jurisdiction in the federal courts to hear the cases in question.",6 Prior to 1985, these doctrines were developed in the context of the "question of overlapping and conflicting state-federal jurisdiction."7 However, in its 1985 decision in National Farmers Union Insurance Companies v. Crow Tribe,' the Supreme Court announced that, while a federal district court does possess federal question jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1331 to determine whether a tribal court has exceeded the lawful limits of its jurisdiction, the "[e]xhaustion of tribal court remedies ... is required before such a claim may be 4. Quackenbush v. Allstate Ins. Co., 116 S. Ct. 1712, 1720 (1996) (citations omitted). See also Willcox v. Consolidated Gas Co., 212 U.S. 19, 40 (1908) ("When a Federal court is propely appealed to in a case over which it has by law jurisdiction, it is its duty to take such jurisdiction."). This duty of the federal courts was characterized by Chief Justice John Marshall as an absolute obligation. See Cohens v. Virginia, 19 U.S. (6 Wheat.) 264,404 (1821) ("We have no more right to decline the exercise of jurisdiction which is given, than to usurp that which is not given. The one or the other would be treason to the constitution."). 5. Quackenbush, 116 S. Ct. at 1720. 6. MARTIN H. REDISH, FEDERAL JURISDICTION: TENSIONS IN THE ALLOCATION OF JUDICIAL POWER 281 (2d ed. 1990). 7. John B. Oakley, Proceedings of the Western Regional Conference on State-Federal JudicialRelationships, 155 F.R.D. 233,334 (1993) (emphasis added). As summarized by Rex Lee and Richard Wilkins, federal courts may abstain from exercising their jurisdiction in favor of state proceedings: (1) where clarification of state law might avoid a federal constitutional ruling (commonly called Pullman abstention); (2) where decision of an unclear issue of state law in a diversity case might threaten important state interests (commonly called Thibodaux abstention); (3) where an assertion of federal jurisdiction might interfere with important state administrative goals (commonly called Burford abstention); (4) where there are simultaneously pending state court proceedings (commonly called Younger abstention); and (5) where there are duplicative state and federal court proceedings (commonly referred to as Colorado River abstention). Rex E. Lee & Richard G. Wilkins, An Analysis of Supplemental Jurisdictionand Abstention with Recommendations for Legislative Action, 1990 BYU L. REv. 321, 335-36. See generally Colorado River Water Conservation Dist. v. United States, 424 U.S. 800 (1976); Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37 (1971); Louisiana Power & Light Co. v. City of Thibodaux, 360 U.S. 25 (1959); Burford v. Sun Oil Co., 319 U.S. 315 (1943); Railroad Comm'n of Texas v. Pullman Co., 312 U.S. 496 (1941). 8. 471 U.S. 845 (1985). 1997] TRIBAL EXHA USTION/ABSTENTION DOCTRINE entertained by a federal court."9 In the subsequent 1987 case of Iowa Mutual Insurance Co. v. LaPlante,° the Court held that, despite the presence of diversity jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1332, "the exhaustion rule announced in National Farmers Union applies."" The rule requires the federal district court, "as a matter of comity"' 2 and for reasons "analogous to principles of abstention,"' 3 to "stay its hand in order to give the tribal court a 'full opportunity to determine its own jurisdiction.""' 4 Almost ten years have now passed since Iowa Mutual reaffirmed the National Farmers Union "exhaustion" doctrine. In the ensuing decade, federal district and appellate courts have issued over eighty reported decisions construing and applying National Farmers Union and Iowa Mutual. The results, to say the least,
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